Capoeira Cindy Read Along

Blog post 8: Alternative Narrative Draft

Character Background

Main Character – Leilani (Hawaiian – Royal child of heaven)

Abuelita paternal grandmother – Ramona/Mona (Spanish – Wise Protector)

Two-Spirit Best Friend – Hajar (Arabic – Stone)

Older/Younger Sister –

Father – African American and Latino

Mother – African American and Hawaiian

Nana – African American maternal grandmother

Statement of Purpose

I chose a multiracial family to challenge the all white characters of the original text and to help multicultural children better see themselves in the text. I allude to the idea that the main character may have Pacific Islander, African American, and Latina heritage but I don’t state it explicitly in the text because that is not a main focus in the text (similar to how my parents learned to eat).

I chose names with meanings that reflect the role and personality of each character. I chose a city setting because it is one that I am more familiar with. I chose to base the city off a combination of Berkeley and New York. I chose Berkeley because the San Francisco Bay Area is well known for its liberal social, political, and economic thinking. I chose New York because of its high levels of intercultural exchange and because it’s where I grew up. In both places inequalities do exist but they are often overlooked. I chose a family structure that was similar to my own, intergenerational. I chose to incorporate Spanish to appeal to English language learners.

The personalities of the main character and her best friend are based off of me when I was younger. Her relationship with her Abuelita represents the relationship I have with my grandfather. Some of her friends and classmates are based off of the people I grew up with. The issues she deals with are issues that I or my friends have faced in school.

I experimented with different perspectives before I chose one. Right now its in the third person but I' like to change it to the first person point of view. It seems more powerful with young Leilani trying to understand the world. It also seemed like a good way to break the typical silence of female main characters in fairytales. There always seems to be someone else telling Her story, as though girls can’t speak for themselves. I think the readers will be able to relate to a heroine that literally speaks directly to them.

            Although the family has specific cultural origins I wanted the book to appeal to a wide audience. I wanted my target audience to be more general but I often found it difficult to see myself in certain texts growing up. So I specifically wanted children of color to feel like they could see themselves in it in some way. Regardless of the background I wanted to create universal characters and a resonant storyline.

            I couldn’t decide if I wanted it to rhyme or not. Rhyming usually helps to appeal to a younger audience. It makes it easier for them to follow along and it makes it easier for them to recall. I also couldn’t decide if I wanted the book to be for adolescents or young children. I went back and forth in between several drafts but I think I'll stick with the 5-7 age group.

Page 1 - In lively location not far away, there’s a city that sits by a bay. This bustling place moves at a rapid pace, it’s filled with cars and not much space.

·         City by the bay

·         Busy street with cars

Page 2 - In a house in the middle of the street where the Amsterdam and Convent meet, live Leilani and her family in building number 123. Nana lives in 456, Hajar in 789. The Sampsons live in 321 and Abuelita on the other side.

·         Our block with 4 row houses

Page 3 - Lelani is a vibrant girl who likes to run and skip and twirl. She likes colors and flare and all things rare. She’ll even eat a bug on a dare.

·         Leilani in a colorful “eccentric” outfit (pearls, doc martens,

·         Friends freaked out by dare

Page 4 - She studies cars, and books, and songs. But there’s one thing she loves most of all. Leilani loves to dance, you see. It means more to her than you or me.

·         Playing with hotwheels and naming cars on the road

·         Reading books and singing songs

·         Dancing

Page 5 - Dancing is Leilani’s gift she picks up moves in class quite swift. On a stage or on TV, a dancer is what she wants to be.

·         Leilani in dance class

·         Leilani as a professional dancer

Page 6 - Then again there just might be something more special to Leilani. More important even than dancing is Leilani’s family!

·         Family portrait/reunion/dinner at grandmas

There are always different parts that make us who we are. Leilani’s many nicknames reflect them all. Daddy calls her “spunky” while she helps him with his tools. Mami calls her “mi vida” when she drops her off at school. Granny calls her “suga” while they practice math rules. Abuelita calls her “niña preciosa” while they bond over stories and food.

·         Picture helping Daddy fix things

·         Getting dropped off at school

·         Playing math games with Grandma

·         Cooking with Abuelita

Leilani’s special bond is with her Abuelita. Their favorite things to do together are cook and tell stories. They make all kinds of savory dishes that remind Abuelita of home. Abuelita comes from a tiny island with lush trees and crystal waters. The hills turn silver in the moonlight and the frogs sing horrible songs. The people are warm and friendly. Everyone knows each other. There are lots of festivals with bright colorful costumes, dance, music, and of course good food.

At home she may be loud and colorful, even dramatic if you may. But in class and afterschool she’s pretty quiet and shy; she hardly talks during the day except to defend her best friend against bullying. It wasn’t always that way. She used to be more outgoing but she started to get bullied for defending her best friend. Her best friend is a girl named Hajar. The older girls at school refer to Hajar as a tomboy. The teachers at afterschool whisper that she might grow up to be a word that Leilani doesn’t recognize. One day she decides to ask Abuelita. Abuelita tells her that there are some people who have two-spirits. “These people are very special and are often misunderstood”. Abuelita says it is good that Leilani has chosen to support her friend. Considering Hajar is Leilani’s second closest friend after Abuelita she never thought twice about defending her.

At school she has several friends but she’s not the most popular. At afterschool she’s well behaved but she’s not the teacher’s favorite. At dance she does well but she’s not the most talented. At home she comes first but everywhere else she seems to settle for second best. Leilani makes a promise to the night star that one day she’ll grow up to be the best at something and stand out.

Blog Post 7: Ina Friedman - How My Parents Learned To Eat

How My Parents Learned to Eat is a story of how a young girl's Japanese mother and American father met and fell in love, but also about the cultural exchange that took place in the process. It is a great book for multicultural and non-multicultural children alike. The book addresses ideas about food culture, cultural exchange, long distance relationships without focusing on the interracial dating or biracial daughter. Since it is not the main focus of the book, it becomes normalized and the reader hardly pays attention to the fact that there's anything different about the narrator or her parents in the first place. The book was published in 1987 but the story seems to take place during a war or occupation (possibly WWII).

I chose this book because it was one of my favorites during the first three or four years of elementary school. This book accompanied my elementary school's Japanese immersion class very well. I was no younger than five and no older than eight when I was introduce to this book. I loved it because even as a child I was a great food enthusiast, and my way of feeling a connection to the Japanese culture was through food and music (and cartoons of course). During the lesson plan for this book, we began learning what chopsticks were and how to use them. We learned about snacks that we'd never seen before like nori and mochi. We were also studying the language. Some of my fondest memories of that part of my childhood and academic career are of this book and that program. The book encourages children to engage in cultural exchange and the fact that my friends I have done it so extensively probably attests to the lessons we learned early on about its value in contexts like these. The best part is knowing we can still count to 100 and eat with chopsticks over a decade later.

Blog Post 6: Jacob Lawrence - The Great Migration

The book I chose for this week was The Great Migration by Jacob Lawrence. This book deals with several social issues. The first and most important issue was the great migration of African Americans from the sharecropping south to the cities of the north around the time of World War I. Artist Jacob Lawrence, “wanted to show just what it cost to ride [those trains]. Uprooting yourself from one way of like to make your way in another involves conflict and struggle. But out of the struggle comes a power and even beauty”.

Jacob Lawrence was a famous painter in the black community. His personal connection to the theme of migration comes from his family’s story of their own journey north: “’And the Migrants kept coming’ is a refrain of triumph over adversity. My family and others left the south on a quest for freedom, justice, and dignity”. His mother was from Virginia and his father was from South Carolina. They met somewhere along their journey north and Lawrence was born in Atlantic City, New Jersey. He moved around a lot himself as a child before finally settling in Harlem New York City in 1930.

The Great Migration was a mass “exodus of African Americans from their homes and farms in the south to the northern industrial cities” in search of a better life and more opportunity. The book gives the reader background on how the migration began providing historical context and painting a picture of the dismal conditions in both the north and the south at the time the movement began.

On one page, the author depicts the racial injustices that took place in the south. He chose four images. The first is a white judge trying two black defendants. The first word that comes to mind when I see this is power (or rather imbalance/abuse of that power). The second is an African American sitting not too far away from a noose hanging from a tree. The first word that came to mind was fear. The third painting is a limp woman sitting at a table next to an empty mixing bowl. This reminded me of despair. The fourth photo was of African American workers bringing their bags of crops (probably cotton) to a white man to have them weighed and priced. This reminded me of submission. This page stood out most to me because I was curious as to how the artist would choose to depict such “heavy” historical concepts and imagery to children. I asked myself, if I were a child reading thi, how would I know that the tone was somber and the events were unfortunate? The creative use of levels, color palette and body language subtly express the despair and inequality. I would definitely recommend this book. Although it is a bit melancholy, such is much of African American history. The author tastefully addresses the subject without being overly graphic or morose.

Tikki Tikki Tembo Podcast

Blog Post 5: Podcast Draft

Maren Scott

Professor Vivian Vasquez

EDU-319-001 Children’s Literature

Tuesday, October 5, 2011

Poscast Review: Tikki Tikki Tembo by Arlene Mosel

My name is Maren Scott. I am a senior at American University from Harlem, New York. In all my years of attending New York City public school the presence of the Asians and Asian Americans in our curricular materials was minimal. Even though I attended exceptional schools that fought to maintain a diverse and inclusive curriculum, the limited resources provided made it difficult. Asian Americans like African Americans are not foreigners but are often treated like so in our American historical narrative. They have been part of our nation’s history for centuries. As a result of this exclusion, many of the texts that have been produced have often been ignorant and or offensive. An example of this is one of my favorite childhood books growing up, Tikki Tikki Tembo by Arlene Mosel published in 1968.

Tikki Tikki Tembo is an award winning children’s book that is referred to as a Chinese folktale “retold” by the author. The purpose of the story is to explain why the Chinese have “little, short names instead of great long names”. Indeed the story is retold but is NOT a Chinese folktale. Nor does it have any legitimacy as to explain the origin or length of Chinese names. Even the New York Times refers to the book as a Chinese folktale retold by Arlene Mosel without any regard for the actual history or its impact on the Chinese and Chinese-American communities. This first problematic thing about the book is that, even if it were a Chinese folktale the author goes to no extent to explain where and when the story originated or took place. The second is that it reinforces the stereotype that Asian names all sound like gibberish.

Mosel heard the story as a child and decided to convert into a children’s book. In the 30s and 40s it was a popular bedtime story in the US. At the time when the book was published, the US was at war with Asia, open racism and stereotyping was widely accepted, and there were limited depictions of Asians in the media let alone in non-stereotypical roles. The combination of these conditions made it easy for the book and author to go unchallenged.

I did some research on the actual origins of the tale. No one has yet found a Chinese folktale resembling this one, but there is a Japanese folktale called Jugemu which it is most likely based off of. It is a rakugo story about a boy with a “great long name” that leads to his demise. The name “Tikki Tikki Tembo No Sa Rembo Chari Bari Ruchi Pip Peri Pembo” however, is completely fictional without any significance in Chinese or Japanese. To confirm, I asked a friend of mine who is a fluent speaker of both if the names meant what they say. Chang can be used as a family name and the characters can mean ruthless, reckless, long, often, trying and to hide. The actual translation for “little or nothing” is “jin”. Knowing that Tikki Tikki Tembo had no significance we looked up the purported meaning instead. The closest translation was “chuen xi je juui hao de” which meant “world’s best”. 

Blog Post 2: A Children's Book That Made A Difference

“Once in jungle, far far away a herd of zebras grazed each day. They pranced and played and had great fun, except one…his stripes were not black but of a brighter hue. Of yellows, greens, and reds, and blues!”

One children’s book that made a difference in my life was entitled The Rainbow Zebra, the basis for the title of this blog. The Rainbow Zebra was a story about a zebra exterior appearance was a source of ridicule and ostracizing. It was especially written and illustrated by a family friend for myself and my younger sister as children. It was always Daddy’s favorite book to read to us more so than our personal favorites (like Tikki Tikki Tembo and Chicka Chicka Boom Boom). Now as an adult and an educator I can see why. Its subject matter was socially and culturally inclusive of gender, race, sexuality, culture, and even personality. The fact that the main character was a rainbow colored animal allowed for less social/political signifiers that could potentially distract us from the morals. My sister and I could easily identify with the main character and learned that there are some differences that come without explanation. We learned that you shouldn’t be ashamed of who you are, and that once everyone gets past their initial differences we can “all play and have fun together”.